Summer Special Memoir vol.5

Passing on the Family Wisdom

Now, my family is no longer living in that small and busy merchant town anymore, except for Grandma Fumi.  My father decided to move his family to a new house attached with an office in which he is going to start a new business.  Fumi prefers to live in her own house that saved herself and her three children from World War II.  Even though this house holds countless memories of various horrendous wartime incidents, she is proud of herself for surviving on her own.  She rarely talks or whines about her honorary drafted husband who died somewhere in the Pacific Ocean.  Back then, she had no choice other than to be tough.  Living in this house represents the feistiness and resilience that she refused to give up many times.  Besides, regardless of her age, she still desired the maximum amount of comfort and support from her mother next door.  Fumi has had special respect and trust with her mother in the traditional Japanese way. 

Everything her parents say is right even if she disagrees.  In fact, Fumi’s mother is the one who encouraged her arranged marriage.  Fumi didn’t want to marry someone she didn’t know.  Fumi and her mother sat on the Tatami mat, face to face, silently.  Fumi’s mother started lecturing her, “This is the fifth visit in three months that his uncle came to ask us to marry you.  You should feel honored to be wanted by this young man.  You should not be stubborn anymore.  It must be a good match.”  Fumi gave in and married a young engineer who had an enthusiastic match-making uncle.  At this point, no one expected this young engineer’s tragic ending and its ripple effect on his family.  I hope that because she learned about him, Fumi at least loved her young husband.  After all, she chooses to live in this house, perhaps, because she treasures the few memories of unforgettable and amazing times.

When I visit Fumi’s emotionally attached house, she routinely hands me one 10 cent coin to shop for something fun in the tiny general store.  I can buy a prism shaped vanilla ice cream bar, the Homerun Bar, from the 10 sweaty cents inside of my fist.  After I lick all the ice cream, I might see the lucky engraving, “Homerun” on the wood stick. This means I can get another bar for free.  Although winning a free ice cream bar is very attractive, the 30 cent chocolate coated ice cream bar looks extravagant.  Since I only receive 10 cents at a time, there is no way for me to purchase the extravaganza.  Another interesting treat are the lottery strawberry candies.  Each of the some fifty strawberry candies have a long sturdy kite string which is surprisingly untangled.  If you are lucky enough to pick a winning string, you can receive a bigger candy than others.  I look seriously at the complicated yet untangled strings in order to pick the best bet for the biggest candy in this Ami’s lottery.  I usually aim for a large one.  But that opportunity doesn’t come so often. 

Though I should feel fortunate because there is no loser in this lottery, instead, I am interested in the 30 cent candy bars called Ghana.  If I get Ghana, I don’t have to gamble.  Ghana itself is a winning.  Ghana is another luxury that I cannot possibly reach.  Unfortunately, Grandma Fumi never taught me any wisdom as simple as saving money for just three days.  In my little mind, ten cents must be used up all at one time, just like a church donation.  A church wouldn’t accept, “Well, I won’t donate anything today, but trust me, I will donate double the amount next time.”  They might not allow me to do any fun activities if I skip the donation, even if I promise God the double donation next time.  Or maybe they would have let me.  I assume they won’t so I don’t try to, in practicality, attempt this. The point is that Fumi expects me to learn things by myself, regardless of my age, maturity level, and lack of life experience.  Her lessons are all developed from her survival.  Do the best you can do.  If you fail, try something else until it works out.  I am too young to learn her extremely sophisticated, silent, and somewhat harsh messages. 

Summer Special Memoir vol. 4

The Town Under the Castle

In addition to the little corner lot of Fumi and her relatives’, there are so many different places to explore in this town.  You can practically go anywhere on foot, even to places beyond the daily needs stores, like the original Samurai Period merchants’ stores: the children’s clinic, the otolaryngology office, the dentist, the electric store, the rice store (Mr. Yoshino), a couple general stores, the yarn store (Ms. Sato), the liquor store, the clock store (Uncle & Aunt Watch and Yasu’s house), the tavern (Mitch’s house), the floral store, the confectionery store, the street car station, the meat store, the fish store, and the Lutheran Church that has a concrete block fenced playground where the neighbor kids often play.  I am one of these kids, even though I don’t consider my family as Christian. 

In the back of the living room corner of Fumi’s house, a black wooden Buddhist altar is sitting at home with dignity.  In the altar, there are a picture of Fumi’s husband, his mortuary, two white candles, a scent jar, two vases, a gold teacup-like gong, a little rice bowl, and two tiny tea cups.  All items in the altar represent appreciation and respect for the family’s ancestors.  It is the heir (usually the first son in the family) family’s responsibility to take care of the altars and graves in the temple.  People believe that their ancestors’ spirit brings happiness and health to the family due to their practice of this consistent ritual.  Every morning, freshly made rice and green tea are served at the altar.  Offering them to the altar before anybody has their meal is a way to respect ancestors and elders.  The candles and green scent are lit accordingly.  Mother does this routine most of the time.  Putting her hands together in front of her chest, she hits the gong twice, closes her eyes, puts her head down, and mumbles a ritual chant for a long time, maybe ten times longer than what one of her kids does.  When she is satisfied with her long prayer for the day, she puts out the candle light by waving her hand to send wind.  “Don’t blow the candles,” she scolds.  Blowing breath at the altar is exclusively prohibited.  It shows disrespect against the ancestors.

All in all, it sounds like some kind of joke that this genuinely Not-Christian family, which is mine, is sending kids to the Christian Sunday School almost every Sunday.  Interestingly enough, my mother, the most serious altar prayer with her long ritual chant, attends the Sunday service with the kids sometimes.  Each child sits on the bench holding 10 cents in their hand for a donation.  The gentle speaking pastor’s wife asks for a volunteer to read a part of the Bible.  A big girl’s name is always called.  Not only does she never ask me to read, but she also ignores my confident hand shooting up in the air.  I sadly conclude that she doesn’t know me well enough.  The best part of the Sunday school are the imaginative and entertaining activities.  Last year’s Christmas play was one of them. Though I always didn’t get a significant role at this church, I truly enjoyed holding the baby Jesus doll in my arms between rehearsals.  I ended up performing as a “tree” in the real play.  Another activity I loved was the old newspaper dress contest.  Teaming up with some new kids, we created a dress with old newspaper and toothpicks.  Surprisingly, our dress didn’t look filthy despite the materials used.  It looked rather gorgeous.  And what satisfaction and accomplishment we shared!  After the dismissal of Sunday school, most of us directly met up at the tiny playground. 

The Church playground has big toys, a swing set, and a sand box for all ages.  Until I went there, I had never seen a jungle gym before.  Climbing up it is like conquering a castle.  I, the king, govern one part of the jungle gym, and the other side is the other kings’ property.  My mother lets us play there any time we want without supervision, even after a visit to the doctor.  By the way, nobody in town ever makes appointments with any doctors.  Most of the medical facilities are walk-in only.  Anyway, it is hard to ignore the playground in between our house and the clinic, especially after having painful shots on my butt.  I am very thankful to have such joyful memories and places in this town, even after I got hit by a donkey.  I wonder whether the good discipline of my Christian church-going habit or my mother’s diligent daily prayer to the Buddhist altar brings me this good fortune.  It might not be either one.  It might be both.  It might be a coincidence.  Do I belong to one particular religious group?  I don’t even understand the meaning of “faith”.

Summer Special Memoir vol. 3

Family Roots at the Town’s Corner

Grandma Fumi’s house can be spotted through the narrow isle between the Yoshino Family (Rice Merchant Family) and the Koresawa family (Grandma Fumi’s maternal home), fifteen yards in from Main Street.  It is exactly where I got hit by the donkey.  Yasu and his parents, the honest watch technician/merchant couple, live in front of Fumi’s house.  We kids often pass through Yasu’s house as convenient.  For instance, I say hi to Uncle Watch (Generally the older male figures are called Uncle and female Auntie for respect and friendliness, even they are not technically family members.) when entering his store from Main Street.  After I socialize with him for a few minutes, I pick up my shoes and go up two steps into the living space right behind his store.  Compared to the commercialized bright, shiny, watch store, their living area is unintentionally as dark as a cave.  Neither the crowded buildings nor the sole window help bring in enough sunlight.  Now I greet Auntie Watch and mingle a little more, perhaps nibble on some candies, and play with Yasu for a while.  Occasionally, he makes incredibly imaginable and creative vehicles out of Legos for me.  If my whole body was the size of Legos, I sure could blast off to space with one of his space ships.  Finally, I excuse myself through their back door to my home.  This shortcut doesn’t really work as well as it should.  Ironically, going through this shortcut takes a longer time than the regular route just because this hunched backed couple and their Lego genius son always welcome me without exception, unlike the Yoshino Family. 

In fact, I have never visited the Yoshino Family’s house.  The keloid faced man is Mr. Yoshino. The dark purple blotches are clear on the dark skin under his glasses.  The house fire was quite unfortunate, but he was fortunate because he at least survived from the terrible inferno when he was young.  Even though I know his past, his facial features scare me away while Uncle Watch’s hunchback doesn’t bother me at all.  I have no interest in learning about him.  He is probably not interested in me either, anyways. 

On the other side of Uncle Watch’s building, Ms. Sato’s yarn store is pretty popular.  In fact, these two business share a building.  Unlike the watch store, Ms. Sato’s yarn store is dark.  Her colorful knitting displays try to cheer up her business space and create a friendly atmosphere.  Some projects are on the wall, and a complicated patterned sweater is shown on the mannequin doll.  Often, the neighbor ladies gather around a small table to chat and share their knitting projects.  This is my mother’s favorite store.  Ms. Sato has a huge smile and welcomes me anytime I visit her with my mother.  But I don’t visit as often as I do with Uncle Watch, because her space didn’t have the shortcut to my house.

In Fumi’s maternal house, Fumi’s mother, Tama, and her first son’s family reside downstairs and the second son’s family upstairs.  All of them are living together under one roof.  These residential buildings (Tama’s, Uncle Watch’s and Ms. Sato’s spaces are all somewhat connected.) Fumi’s and Yoshino family’s houses are both separated with less than three feet of space between them (Sadly, that causes quite a few unpleasant lawsuits among family members and close neighbors.) Huddling together at the corner lot, the buildings still standing there barely survived from the inferior bombs dropping from the sky during the war.  The American military planned to exclude the Japanese historical buildings like castles, temples, and shrines from their “destroy” list. However, the surrounding towns happened to become their targets as a consequence.  Unfortunately, Fumi’s town was a typical target.  After her husband was drafted, Fumi came back from Osaka (217 miles from home) with three little children all under five, in fact, the youngest was the newborn infant.  The respectful visit to her in-law’s house turned out to be her worst choice.  No one wanted their daughter-in-law or their grandchildren.  They, too, were barely surviving during the difficult war time.  “We don’t need any more mouths to feed.” That’s what her father-in-law said.  Luckily, Fumi’s parents extended their arms openly, even though, at that time, Fumi’s parents had about 10 children.  (Fumi is the first child of sixteen siblings.)  This extended family ate together, worked together, played together, and evacuated together under the incendiary rain.  The survival from the fatal war itself was a miracle.  Keeping their house and property was another miracle.  There could have been hundreds of people who died on the street where I got hit by the donkey.  The whole town’s rapid recovery was indescribably miraculous.

Fumi’s kitchen has a special underground room to store food. I suspect it used be an evacuation unit where family members hid when they heard the frequent war siren.  Now she uses it as a punishment dungeon for the naughty children.  My blood freezes immediately when she touches the knob on the floor, even if I don’t do anything wrong.  Grandma Fumi’s bedroom is on the other side of the kitchen.  I often sit on her bedside to ask her to tell me a story of a Japanese folktale, the Peach Boy.  No one except Fumi in our neighborhood has their own modern western type bed.  It is way softer and bouncier than a futon.  I wish I could sleep in a bed someday.  Every evening, the majority of the neighbors take out their futon and cot from their paper sliding door closet.  In the morning, they fold them nicely, and put them away into the closet. Although, owning your own bed will reduce daily physical tasks, owning a bed was something too modern for the general population of the town at that time.  Besides, as an honorably deceased Japanese soldier’s wife, the western items are things you do not consider owning.  But she does what she wants.

When I visit my grandma’s maternal home by stepping on the stones outside of her house, Fumi’s first brother’s white spitz dog, Chiko, greets me with high pitch barks.  I make it through the sliding door entrance only once in five tries without any troubles because of Chiko.  Grandma Fumi’s first brother, Chiko’s owner, becomes known as Uncle Chiko, and his wife as Auntie Chiko.  Uncle Chiko is one of only two boys from sixteen of Fumi’s siblings.  The other boy is Uncle Koma.  Koma means “small and young” in the regional dialect.  Technically, there was another boy between Uncle Chiko and Uncle Koma along with several girls.  Sadly he deceased at age one.  His name was Issai, which means One-Year-Old.  This is one of the several family wonders: why my great grandparents named him Issai in the first place.  It sounded almost like a curse on the innocent and unfortunate child.  That’s what the neighbors and even Issai’s siblings said about behind Tama’s back.

Fumi’s father used to be a famous inventor, known mainly for his carpentry tools.  Someone stole his idea one day, and got a patent with quite a large award.  Despite this nasty fraud incident, Fumi’s Father retained a solid reputation among customers as a carpenter to be able to feed sixteen children.  He was the one respected family man until his secret love affair was revealed by his devastated children several decades after his death. 

To reveal another family wonder: how did the two boys, Uncle Chiko and Uncle Koma, live together under one roof while never got along each other in their entire life? I have never seen both boys together talking or laughing with each other, like regular brothers would, on any occasion, even during the wedding of Chiko’s daughter.  The boys’ ongoing battle never ended even after the judge’s rule in the court forty years later.